As the tremours get fiercer, the sound of trees falling can soon be heard, and before long the sight of a giant bear storming down the mountainside come into view for all to see, with Aurelia riding on his back.
Upon seeing him, all of the opposing soldiers begin to make a run for it, even the two Legendary Masters stop everything to try and leave. Seeing this, both Aurelia and I use whatever means we can to slow them down. And it's enough as Gaoh tears right through the army rushing towards the two of them at top speed.
They probably realise that there's no escape as both Flavius and Nonus soon come to a stop and turn around, engaging both Gaoh and Aurelia in battle. And to tip things more into our favour, I too rush over to join the battle in hopes of sneaking the last hit in for some nice experience.
For the first time since the fall of the Big Metal Dragons, Nonus makes an aggressive move as he punches the claw of Gaoh that was coming down upon him. On contact, a blast of air was released, generating a strong shockwave that sent the few remaining common soldiers flying and even pushed me back slightly. Flavius follows up by throwing a few swords of fire towards Aurelia as a greatsword of fire takes form and lunges up for a strike on her. In tandem with my Water Wall, Aurelia's barrier was enough to push him away but he counters with changing his target to Gaoh's body, despite having been thrown back by the barrier. But given the limitations of movement while in air, Gaoh is able to fend off the attack as an armour of wind and lightning surrounds his body, coupled with Aurelia's barrier, Flavius's followup was completely negated.
I don't remain still either, just as Flavius lands, I create a small zone of darkness around both Nonus and Flavius. Although it is quickly illuminated by the intense flames of Flavius, the time was enough for Aurelia to get a good shot with her Aurelia Beam, while I use three-pronged shrapnel attack. Nonus's quick reflexes allow him to avoid taking any significant damage, but Flavius isn't so well off as he now finds his right arm and half of his left arm to have been completely vaporised by Aurelia's attack, and to rub salt on his wounds, he took the full brunt of my attack on the open wound left by Aurelia, lodging thousands of metal shards into his body.
Looking at his ally, Nonus says, "there is an old saying when encountering strong monsters you can't fight. When running away, you don't need to be faster than your opponent, just be faster than the person next to you. Don't hold it against me, see ya," quickly making an exit for himself, leaving Flavius behind.
Seeing Nonus run, leaving him to his fate, Flavius yells, "you son of a bitch!"
Now severely injured, with little means of fighting back, Flavius attempts to run but is soon stopped by my walls and Aurelia's barriers.
"Damn it! Since it's come to this, I won't go down so easily!" Flavius yells running straight at us as his body begins to glow.
The heat radiating off of Flavius get stronger and stronger as he approaches, singeing the ground with every step. The light he gives off is gradually making his features harder and harder to distinguish. It doesn't take much to figure out that he is trying to drag us all down with him. Aurelia tries to isolate him while also putting up barriers to protect herself and Gaoh. But I find her efforts to be rather pointless because of the nature of Flavius's attacks. With few ways to fight back, I move to pick Flavius up, wrapping my tail around his and firmly locking him within my grasp. As expected, within a few moments his body explodes. The energy from the blast is enough for me to release my grip and send me flying, but I still managed to contain the explosion by taking on most of it for myself. Despite how impactful it looked at first glance, the explosion didn't really do much to me as I only took a bit of damage from the pressure, nothing much, only 22,793 damage. Did I say it didn't do much? I meant that it tons of damage, holy shit, I nearly saw my life flash before my eyes. I didn't think the pressure from the explosion alone would do so much. If it wasn't for the flames that were also released healing me, I'm not sure I could have survived that. I really didn't think it would do so much without the damage from the blast itself and the following fire... fuck, it blew the end of my tail off!
"Heeeyyy! You alright over there!?" I hear Aurelia call from beside Gaoh.
"Do I look alright to you!"
"Don't worry about, I'll get up back to full capacity real soon, just let me eat this guy's soul first... the soul of a Legendary Master is certainly great. Not only does it taste good, but I got a few nice abilities from him. Like this," Aurelia says, throwing several swords of fire at me to absorb.
Aurelia starts walking over to my body and soon I find myself bathed in a warm and soothing golden light. Right before my eyes, I see my tail regenerating and after a minute I find myself at full health with no injuries to speak of. Is there really nothing Aurelia can't do?
"I'll leave that to your imagination, but we have more important things to do right now. Help me gather up our forces to prepare to pursue. I don't intend to leave any loose ends."